Trophy and Shadowscream

[Ilona]

I got my (non humming) hammer and anvil for the trophy quest only. I've never been one of those that could farm hollowshade easily, so always chose other ways of skilling up smithing (I have one 300 smith, one 257 smith and one 240 smith).

To make my non humming hammer hum, and to make the tunic, I need 5 each of shrieking and wailing substances. While I've managed to get three wailing substances on two run-throughs of the owlbears in Paludal Caverns, over an hour of killing the sonic wolves in Hollowshade (no war going on) only netted me one shrieking substance. Should I try hunting in Tenebrous Mountains instead? Is there anywhere else that they will drop more often, without needing to start the Hollowshade war?

[Twistagain]

I got my (non humming) hammer and anvil for the trophy quest only. I've never been one of those that could farm hollowshade easily, so always chose other ways of skilling up smithing (I have one 300 smith, one 257 smith and one 240 smith).

To make my non humming hammer hum, and to make the tunic, I need 5 each of shrieking and wailing substances. While I've managed to get three wailing substances on two run-throughs of the owlbears in Paludal Caverns, over an hour of killing the sonic wolves in Hollowshade (no war going on) only netted me one shrieking substance. Should I try hunting in Tenebrous Mountains instead? Is there anywhere else that they will drop more often, without needing to start the Hollowshade war?

The war is BY FAR the easiest way to do it. It's not difficult to do (in fact, it is running with no intervention constantly as long as a group hasn't taken over the whole zone. All you have to do is go to the huts in the far south and kill the grimling defenders when they spawn. They will spawn when another group (from the West caves) attacks the south. The attackers (Owlbears originally) will walk up and the entire south will turn into that race.

To get wolves, just eliminate grimlings first and wait until the Owlbear defenders spawn. It could take a few attacks (every 15 min?), but it will happen. Then, the substances are not very rare...maybe 1 in 10 or thereabouts? Hard to say, as I round up 50 or more at a time and my fiance AEs 'em.

[Xenephex]

The couple times I've been in there, I haven't had to manipulate anything (good thing too, since I don't know how). The wolves and owlbears just alternate with each all by themselves every once in a while.

And yes, I tried the owlbear caves for a while before discovering the islands and never got a substance to drop; but they are pretty common on island mobs - better than 1 in 10 I think - more like 1 in 6 or so.

[Rwauld]

Use HSM war to farm the islands

Using the HSM war is the best idea to get the substance. If it's not already running, you just have to kill the Grimling chieftan to start it. Then kill the grimling defenders when the owlbears attack. Then go to the islands in the south and wait for the owlbears to win. The grimlings will depop and the islands will spawn with owlbears. A high lvl can clean out 2 or 3 islands easy and get about 5-10 wailing substance (more than what's needed for the task combine and quests for humming.) Now you just have to wait for the wolves to attack the owlbears in the south. About every 10 minutes one side will attack the other. The pattern usually runs counter clockwise with side holding one camp attacking the side that holds 2 camps. So after the initial owlbear attack in the south, the wolves will attack the North Western caves and win (barring interference). Next the owlbears will attack the North East caves and win, then the wolves will attack the south camp and win...islands spawn with wolves...start farming for shrieking substance

[Ngreth Thergn]

OK. Then for now I will be leaving this as is.

Shadowscream combines for the tasks will NOT change on the 3/14 patch.

I will still consider conversation on the subject for the future, but it sounds like this is not something that needs to be changed, so you will need to do some hard convincing I am still slightly concerned with the iksar bit, but it seems ok.

[Maevenniia]

OK. Then for now I will be leaving this as is.

Shadowscream combines for the tasks will NOT change on the 3/14 patch.

I will still consider conversation on the subject for the future, but it sounds like this is not something that needs to be changed, so you will need to do some hard convincing I am still slightly concerned with the iksar bit, but it seems ok.

ACK. Noooooo!

/sigh

some of us avoided doing those {goshdarn} quests for a reason.

[Twistagain]

ACK. Noooooo!

/sigh

some of us avoided doing those {goshdarn} quests for a reason.

Yeah, but the question is "what was the reason?" I'd wager that most people who avoided it had the "I don't want to farm all those substances/shadows" reason...in this case, you are only farming enough for 3 items. That's like half an hour of farming (not counting travel time). It's more difficult to do the initial quests (which people are reporting finishing in 4 hours or less.)

[Maevenniia]

Nooooo, I've helped friends farm the substances. As a wizard I am a PBAE farming goddess, and I find it a llot of fun. BUT....

The reason was I didn't want to do the *bleeping* quest for the stupid anvil and hammer. I still don't. And I don't think I should have to. It's that's simple.

But now I have NO CHOICE, if I want my trophy.

[Ndaara]

the hammer & anvil quest was mildly annoying, mainly because the RNG hates me and the bloodling carapaces were not dropping for me. otherwise it's just not that hard. getting the shimmering stuff and the highland sludge is MUCH harder, at least for me it is.

if it's just the bloodling carapaces you don't want to hunt, you can buy or borrow the armor from someone. it's trade-able.

the rest of it is just repairing some shields. isn't it? i just took a look at the quest and unless i missed something, the ONLY issue you'll have is if someone else is repairing a shield at the same time you want to, in which case, pick a different guard... the truly annoying bit of shadowscream was the norent swirlies, which was fixed years ago. the owlbears were up in Hollowshade so i got a handful of substances from them, then headed to tenebrous. picked up the essences of wind and acrylia i needed for the acrylia portion of my trophy while hunting the wolf substances.

all in all, it wasn't nearly as stressful as i expected it to be. almost made me wish i'd spent time pharming that instead of making sickles! ALMOST!

[Maevenniia]

I don't care how easy (or how hard) the quest is...it is not a quest that I find I have ANY desire to do.

I do the quests I WANT to do.

This one wasn't one of them.

Just as requiring items (like Highland sludge) that are in locked zones is unreasonable, I feel it is unreasonable to force people to do the Shadowscream quest.

example: How would you feel if you could not obtain your brewing trophy unless you'd also done the Aid Grimel quest up to the brewing part, because you absolutely had to hand in a double brewed Kaladim Constitutional as one of the tasks?

Maybe I'm being unreasonable, but I do NOT like being forced to do a quest I deliberately made a choice to avoid.

[Rwauld]

I do think they tweaked the drop rate on the carapaces. I only spent 3 hours getting the 16 needed to start the quest chain again. (yes...I destroyed all my stuff after I passed the trivials ). Having said that, I am hanging onto the bloodling plate turn in in case anyone needs to jumpstart the quest. I'm on stromm if anyone wants to borrow it, but I want it BACK.

[Ndaara]

fair enough, Maev.

i sure get frustrated when tradeskill drops come from flagged and locked and raid only zones, because i don't have time to raid (hardly have time to group) and those are pretty much permanently closed to me.

so i definitely understand the feeling of being forced into doing something i don't want to (or just plain can't) do.

even though shadowscream doesn't fall into this category for me, i can still totally understand your frustration =(

[namime]

this is the first time i do this quest. And i like it. the quest progresses each time i completed something and give me a better tool to use it to create something more. As i didn't take the shadowscream route to skill up, I don't think i would do that quest if not for the throphy requirement and I am thankful that it is in there.

[Kahmon]

I am still slightly concerned with the iksar bit, but it seems ok.

As an Iksar I had no problems doing this quest & would recommend Shadowscream as the method of skilling from 223-267. The only people that should have problems with this are those that destroyed their kitty faction at some point.

I don't care how easy (or how hard) the quest is...it is not a quest that I find I have ANY desire to do.

I do the quests I WANT to do.

This one wasn't one of them.

Just as requiring items (like Highland sludge) that are in locked zones is unreasonable, I feel it is unreasonable to force people to do the Shadowscream quest.

example: How would you feel if you could not obtain your brewing trophy unless you'd also done the Aid Grimel quest up to the brewing part, because you absolutely had to hand in a double brewed Kaladim Constitutional as one of the tasks?

Maybe I'm being unreasonable, but I do NOT like being forced to do a quest I deliberately made a choice to avoid.

You could either choose not to do the smithing trophy or you could look at the big picture and see the hammer and anvil quest as a sub-quest to the trophy. Lots of quests have sub-quests involved. This is just one of them.

As for your twice brewed constitutionals example: the dusts are droppable. All you need is someone (if not yourself) who is a 220 brewer with the Terris Thule flag to go up to Grimel and trigger the quest. They then destroy the barrel and give you the dusts.

You could also skill up to 300 and do the masters trophy. No Shadowscream needed there.

[Ilona]

Maev,
I have the bloodling carapace that's needed to skip part of this quest. I was lucky to find it on a vendor as I'd never done the quest before either.
You are more than welcome to borrow it.